Want to grow your business faster?
One step is growing raving fans of digital communities to earn and lift your engagement and loyalty within them.
Key steps,
- Digital community building – starts with your business’s bold purpose – telling a bigger story than just your products and services that aligns with causes in a broader community,
- This approach enables rapid growth, provides a high return on investment at lower risk levels, and encourages high-performing teams who align with the bold purpose.
One example is Patagonia – central to the community and growth are the shared values of climate change, the need to protect the planet, the circular economy – buy one great jacket – keep it much longer – rather than cheap copies – fuelled enormous growth.
Another example is the recent Australian Federal election. The so-called Teals built a community within key electorates – Teal movement’s purpose was to fix the community issues – lack of integrity and failure to address climate change. They achieved community building within only a few months.
The community building flywheel comprises these steps,
1. Shared purpose builds community and companionship,
You can be at a bustling party but feel alone. It’s about feeling understood – shared values – purpose, and a sense of making a difference.
2. Weird in the same way,
Communities allow members to express themselves that might seem weird elsewhere,
The Teal community members might find discussing door knocking each weekend, endless battles talking to non-believers, and the current actions of the sitting MP all a bit odd when talking to non-community members,
What’s weird elsewhere is expected within the community – it allows people to be proudly weird together,
3. Access
Community is networking – it provides access to key influencers. Access includes accessing pooled resources.
4. Feeling seen and heard
A community lets you feel accepted – the shared purpose is just the beginning – shared values, shared assumptions, there’s a lower likelihood of conflict.
Over a decade ago, the community-business growth began with companies such as US-based Gymshark and Drunk Elephant – with organic social media as the accelerator – they put building community at the core of their growth strategies.
They went beyond a social presence to actively build an engaged community that mentions their
- business in social media posts,
- shares posts about the business,
- tags the business in posts,
- tags friends in the business feed,
Superior engagement levels usually translate into higher conversion rates and more revenue.
Key metrics are
- More than 70% of the content is user generated,
- The percentage of viewers who like, comment, or share the content—is more than 2 per cent,
- More than 4.5% of online traffic converts to sales,
How can you replicate this?
1) Find shared purpose and values that intersect between your brand and those in the broader community.
2) It is no longer about demographics but shared values (see my previous newsletters) – you are building a movement,
3) Communicating is via organic social media,
4) There is a fine line between coming across all sales – and building a movement. The latter is the key.
5) A strategic narrative and pitch are vital – your business has to tell a story more significant than your products and services, differentiates your business, and build community and power growth – these aren’t just a few dot point changes on your website.
6) Reflect and integrate the language the community uses, compelling enough that buyers want to share and fuel the conversations on social.
7) Social feedback and ideas is market testing in real time – it is to be encouraged, not controlled.
It is time to ACCELERATE communities of PASSIONATE NEW BUYERS by fuelling and facilitating their insatiable hunger for authentic content and conversations – so your business captures enormous attention and engagement – influence and sell more.
Now the most valuable asset in the world today is attention.
The FASTEST growing businesses have one thing in common they get more attention on multiple social media platforms – every day.
- More attention first
- Next More engagement
- Influence and Sell More.
Our business reflects the human truth: we are a social and human-first digital agency built on strategic narrative and pitch across platforms.
We accelerate powerful buyer insights gained through micro-content that ultimately influences actual business results.
Your ideal buyer truth is our lifeblood – we are loyal to it, defend it and accelerate it.
There is no longer a single, generic message served to a mass audience – now drive buyer attention and revenue growth by speaking specifically and differently based on who they are, by listening and understanding more.
If you have read this far, thank you for your attention.
There are over 150 free previous newsletters – like this one at accelerateyourbusiness.today – look for the tab – How to Influence and Sell More.
It means a lot. I hope this helped you even a little bit in better making sense of this topic. If so, please, share it with a friend who might also benefit from it.
Thanks for reading,
David
